Throughout this year, several bloggers will engage in a conversation here and on their blogs — asking questions of each other and responding. Others are absolutely welcome to join the conversation, as well. Learn more about the ladies of Blogversation 2012.
We’re rotating through the Blogversation participants a second time, with each blogger posing a question to the others and to any visitors who’d like to weigh in.
The schedule calls for a question from Lauren McCabe (mermaidchronicles.com, @mermaidtales on Twitter) but Lauren has an incredible convergence of goodness going on right now — she recently started a new job that’s got her immersed, she’s just bought a house and she’s newly engaged.
Wow.
So in honor of Lauren and her fiance — and for all of us — I’m asking the following question: What’s your best piece of relationship advice?
Several years ago, an elderly married couple who’d been together many decades told me the key to a happy marriage was for each partner to think they’ve gotten the better end of the bargain.
On the surface, it’s a cute little quip.
But the deeper meaning, I think, is that both partners should feel like they somehow lucked into marrying someone better than they deserve and they’ve got to hustle to keep that out-of-my-league mate happy.
By staying on your game, you keep your mate feeling that he’s the one who’s gotten the better deal — and it’s the very definition of a virtuous circle.
The alternative is the all-too-common marriage where each partner feels he or she is the only one doing anything around the house … he never brings me flowers any more and she stopped taking care of her appearance as soon as we had kids … each partner feels like they’ve got the worse end of the bargain.
Incidentally, I think this works in other relationships, too. If you treat your job like you’re lucky to be there, or treat your best friend like you’re lucky to have her, it might also have lovely benefits.
I also loved this post I wrote for our 10-year wedding anniversary: 10 marriage lessons learned in 10 years of marriage (and the second half of that post, which I broke up into five “I dos” and five “I don’ts”).